page_title: Lily Tomlin
section_title: Return to television
hierarchical_section_title: Lily Tomlin / Career / Return to television
caption_attribution_description: Lily Tomlin
context_page_description: Mary Jean "Lily" Tomlin is an American actress, comedian, writer, singer, and producer. Tomlin started her career as a stand-up comedian as well as performing Off-Broadway during the 1960s. Her breakout role was on the variety show Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In from 1969 until 1973. She currently stars as Frankie Bergstein on the Netflix series Grace and Frankie, which debuted in 2015 and has earned her nominations for four Primetime Emmy Awards, three Screen Actors Guild Awards and a Golden Globe Award.
  In 1974, Tomlin was cast by Robert Altman in her first film; her performance as Linnea Reese in Nashville won her several awards and nominations for the Golden Globe and Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress.
  In 1977, her performance as Margo Sperling in The Late Show won her the Best Actress Award at the Berlin International Film Festival and nominations for the Golden Globe and BAFTA Award for Best Lead Actress. Her other notable films include 9 to 5, All of Me, Big Business, Flirting with Disaster, Tea with Mussolini, I Heart Huckabees, and Grandma.
context_section_description: Tomlin voiced Ms. Valerie Frizzle on the animated television series The Magic School Bus from 1994 to 1997. Also, in the 1990s, Tomlin appeared on the popular sitcom Murphy Brown as the title character's boss. She also guest starred on The X-Files in 1998, in episode 6 ("How The Ghosts Stole Christmas") of season 6 as a ghost haunting an old mansion. In 2005 and 2006, she had a recurring role as Will Truman's boss Margot on Will & Grace. She appeared on the dramatic series The West Wing for four years (2002–2006) in the recurring role of presidential secretary Deborah Fiderer.
  In the 2008–2009 fifth season of Desperate Housewives, she has a recurring role as Roberta, the sister of Mrs. McCluskey (played by Kathryn Joosten who coincidentally had played Tomlin's secretarial predecessor on The West Wing). During the 2008 Emmy Awards, Tomlin appeared as part of a tribute to the influential 1960s television series Laugh-In. Tomlin voiced Tammy in the 2005 The Simpsons episode "The Last of the Red Hat Mamas". Tomlin provided a voice for the film Ponyo on the Cliff by the Sea, which was released in August 2009.
  Since its launch in 2008, Tomlin has been a contributor for wowOwow.com, a website for women to talk culture, politics, and gossip.
  Tomlin and Kathryn Joosten were in talks to star in a Desperate Housewives spin-off, which was given the green light in May 2009. The series plan was scrapped due to Joosten's illness, a recurrence of lung cancer; Joosten died on June 2, 2012, twenty days after the onscreen death from cancer of her character Karen McCluskey. In 2010, Tomlin guest-starred as Marilyn Tobin in the third season of Damages opposite Glenn Close, for which she was nominated for an Emmy. She also appeared in the NCIS episode titled "The Penelope Papers", playing Penelope Langston, the grandmother of Agent Timothy McGee (Sean Murray). In 2012, Tomlin guest starred on the HBO series Eastbound and Down as Tammy Powers, mother of the main character Kenny Powers, and appeared in three episodes of Season 3.
  Tomlin co-starred with Reba McEntire in the TV series Malibu Country as Reba's character's mother Lillie Mae. The series started shooting in August 2012 with a premiere date of November 2, 2012, at 8:30 pm ET but was canceled in 2013 after 18 episodes.
  Tomlin stars opposite Jane Fonda, Martin Sheen, and Sam Waterston in the Netflix original series Grace and Frankie. Tomlin plays Frankie Bergstein, recently separated from her husband of forty years (Waterston) while Fonda plays Grace Hanson, recently separated from her husband (Sheen). Grace and Frankie become reluctant friends after learning their husbands are leaving them to be with one another. She received her first Emmy nomination in 2015 as a lead actress for the role.
  Tomlin reprises her role as now Professor Frizzle in the 2017 Netflix sequel The Magic School Bus Rides Again, a continuation of the original series.
caption: Tomlin in 2008
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